The Great Wall of Lucy Wu

by Wendy Wan-Long Shang

  More girls arrived, and someone started playing music. I stood in the doorway to the kitchen, hoping to block their view.

  Yi Po looked like a TV chef on fast-forward. She swiftly mixed together the pork with the seasonings. Mom cut open the first package of dumpling wrappers and set out a small bowl of water on the table. Mrs. Jameson began filling up pots of water and setting them on the stove.

  I looked at the clock. It was already 5:15. By the time they’re done, we’ll have to rush to go trick-or-treating, I thought. We should have ordered pizza.

  “What’s going on?” Serena poked her head in. “What’s for dinner?”

  “We’re supposed to have dumplings, but there’s been a small prob …” Before I could finish, Serena pushed her way past me into the kitchen.

  “You guys are making dumplings? Wow!” she exclaimed. She picked up a dumpling wrapper. “Can I make one?”

  Yi Po stopped and showed her what to do. She laid the wrapper in the palm of Serena’s hand and added a dollop of pork filling in it. Then she dabbed her finger in the water and wet the half of the outer edge, and then closed the wrapper with a row of little pleats.

  Yi Po held it out in her palm. One perfect dumpling, I thought, and only about three hundred to go. And what’s Serena going to say? Is anyone else going to come in?

  Before I knew it, more girls crowded by the kitchen door. They stared at Yi Po.

  “Hey, you guys, you don’t have to come in here. It’s just dumplings, and we’re going to order pizza,” I said. I wanted to kick myself. Having dumplings was the worst idea in the history of birthday parties.

  But Serena had a different idea. “Hey! Get in here! This is so cool!”

  Did she say cool?

  Haley went into class-president mode, all manners and meet-and-greet. “Hi, Mrs. Wu,” she said to my mom. “Lucy, I know your mom, but I’ve never met your …”

  “Oh!” I fumbled for a second. “This is my grandmother’s sister, my great-aunt. Yi Po.” I tensed for a second, waiting.

  Haley and Yi Po each raised a hand and said hi. Even when Yi Po says hi, it sounds Chinese to me. Then Haley said, “How do you do that? How can you do that so fast?”

  “That’s amazing!” said Lauren. “I want to do that.”

  Talent slid into the kitchen. “I can help,” she said. “I’ve done this before.”

  Mom, Yi Po, and Talent each helped one girl with her dumpling. Before I knew it, there were a dozen dumplings, the slightly misshapen ones joining the trim, pleated ones.

  Madison brought in a few more chairs to crowd around the table. “I think the party’s in here!” she said cheerfully. More dumplings began to fill the tray in the middle of the table.

  I took a seat and looked around. Bethany and Kelly were cracking up at Lauren’s dumpling, which looked more like a turtle. Haley and Madison got into a serious discussion about whether you should hold the dumpling in your right or left hand. Talent reminded everyone not to get meat on the edge, or the grease would make it hard to seal the wrapper. Everyone was having a great time.

  “She’s the queen,” said Serena, nodding at Yi Po. “She’s the Queen of the Dumplings.” I double-checked her words to make sure Serena wasn’t making fun of Yi Po, but she really seemed to mean it. And judging from the heads nodding around the table, everyone seemed to agree. Mom and Talent were good, but Yi Po seemed to have some extra trick for making quick, neat folds — she made two in the time most people barely made one.

  Mom leaned over and translated for Yi Po. Yi Po laughed and said something in reply. I leaned forward to see if I could catch any words that I knew.

  Mom said, “Lucy’s aunt says that she’s actually quite slow. There are many people who are faster than she is, and her arthritis has slowed her down quite a bit, too.”

  “No way!” exclaimed Serena. “That’s impossible!”

  Yi Po looked up and grinned at Serena while still making the dumplings, and at that moment, I realized the party wasn’t going to be a disaster. Maybe it’d even be good or great. With everyone helping, we were actually going to make all the dumplings in no time. Maybe that’s how dumplings were supposed to be made — everyone sitting around, making them together, while laughing and talking.

  Then came the actual eating of the dumplings. I think all that work just made everyone hungrier, and even Talent said they were the best dumplings she had ever had. Mom and Yi Po set out little bowls of soy sauce, vinegar, and hot sauce so everyone could try different kinds of sauces. We ate so much that when we went trick-or-treating everyone groaned and complained about how full they were. I swear even my French fry costume felt tight.

  “I am not eating any candy tonight,” moaned Haley. “I will absolutely explode if I eat one more thing.”

  Madison took one bite of a Three Musketeers, her favorite, and then threw the rest back in her bag. “We’re going to be waddling to Barcroft Oaks,” she joked.

  At the end of the night, Madison and I agreed that it was the best party we had ever had — so far. And the funniest part was, without a doubt, it wouldn’t have happened without Yi Po.

  Which made what happened the next day that much worse.

  After we had an enormous brunch with scrambled eggs and French toast, Mrs. Jameson gave me a ride home. I was looking through my Halloween loot — we had gotten full-size candy bars in Barcroft Oaks — when I heard her say, “Oh, dear. What on earth happened here?”

  I looked up and my stomach jumped. The tree in my front yard had been TP’d. The entire tree was completely covered in toilet paper, so thick in some places you couldn’t tell there was a tree underneath. When the wind blew, the loops of toilet paper swayed in unison.

  Dad and Kenny were already outside, cleaning up. Kenny was holding a trash bag open and Dad was pulling down the toilet paper with a rake. Our neighbor, Mr. Ellicott, was also outside, talking to Dad.

  “It’s such a waste,” I heard him say to Dad when I got out of the car. “There must be twenty rolls of toilet paper up there.”

  “At least,” agreed Dad, pulling down another rake full of toilet paper. “And this is after my aunt scared them off. Who knows what else they would have done?”

  “Ah, well, Halloween tradition, I guess,” said Mr. Ellicott.

  That’s it, I thought. It’s just some stupid random Halloween prank.

  “Hey, Lucy,” said Dad when he saw me. “Put your stuff in the house and then come outside and help clean up.”

  I thanked Mrs. Jameson for driving me home, and got out of the car. And then I saw what else had been done.

  My basketball hoop was destroyed. Sodden toilet paper balls had been smacked onto the backboard, making it look like it had a weird case of chicken pox. And the hoop had been pulled on until it was a sad mouth hanging down from the backboard.

  “Hurry up, Lucy!” called Dad. “This is going to take all morning.”

  I swallowed hard, trying to ignore the sick feeling rising up from my stomach. It has to be Sloane. She knows where I live. The sentence started playing itself over and over in my head, changing the emphasis from word to word. She knows where I live. She knows where I live. She knows where I live. It was as if this terrible fact would change if I could just find a different way to say the sentence. But it only seemed worse each time.

  Through the window, I saw Yi Po come into the living room. As soon as she saw me, she stopped and stared at me, and then turned her head slightly to look at the hoop. I wondered what she had seen, if the people she had seen were boys or girls, my age or older. I wondered if she had questions she wanted to ask me, the way I had questions for her.

  When I walked into the house to drop off my bags and presents, Yi Po pointed to the front yard and said something. Then she raised the pitch of her voice and began talking more quickly, making it harder for me to understand. She raised one hand over her head, and then lowered her hand. The words flew over my head.

  Mom walked in and looked at Yi Po. Then she s
aid, “Yi Po says that she saw three girls last night, one very tall one. She says that you might know the other girls.”

  Yi Po had seen Gabi and Ariana, of course. And tall was definitely the operative word when it came to Sloane.

  I tried to keep my face expressionless, but inside, I felt a crack. The carefully constructed wall I had kept between Sloane and the rest of my life was turning to glass, and Yi Po was holding a hammer.

  “No,” I said firmly. I shook my head. “I have no idea who would do this.” I definitely did not want my parents to get involved. If they found out, they would make a huge deal over it, and in the end, Sloane would just have twice as many reasons to make my life miserable.

  “Lucy, if you know who did this, your father and I want to know. This is vandalism,” said Mom. “They have damaged our property.”

  I looked at Yi Po. She looked puzzled. I could almost hear her thoughts. You know who these people are. Why aren’t you saying anything?

  “Would you please tell Yi Po …” I hesitated — I almost said I don’t know who she’s talking about, but I changed it slightly “… none of my friends would do this.” That was true, but really, the more accurate statement would be: My not-friends did this.

  Mom translated for me. When she was finished, Yi Po turned to me, her eyes narrowed slightly. Not angry, but firm. Resolved.

  “Zhi dao le,” she said.

  I already know.

  Sixteen days after Halloween came my real birthday — I was officially twelve. Kenny woke me up by sticking one of his buds in my ear and blaring the “Happy Birthday” song from his iPod — the Beatles version. Then he bounced up and down on the side of my bed, singing in a high-pitched voice and cranking out a solo on his air guitar.

  “Go away,” I said from under my pillow, ripping out the earbud. “It’s going to be your deathday if you don’t leave me alone.” I shoved him off the bed.

  Mom made cupcakes for me to take to school. I was a little embarrassed — twelve is kind of old to be taking cupcakes to school. On the other hand, everyone seemed to like them, including Harrison. Especially Harrison.

  “Great cupcakes,” he said, licking the last bit of frosting off his fingers. “Lemon is my favorite.”

  “Really?” I think Mom had made lemon because that was the only box of cake mix in the house. I mentally filed away that little piece of information, under Cool Stuff About Harrison.

  When I got home, Yi Po was in the kitchen, where it looked like she had been working for hours. The counters were full of prepped and chopped vegetables and meats.

  I had been avoiding Yi Po as much as I could since the toilet paper incident. I felt like I had disappointed her, and I worried that she would figure out a way to tell my parents what I knew. What she thought I knew, anyway.

  I tried to spend even more time on practicing my shots. Even though Dad had done his best to fix up the old hoop, every time I looked at the dinged-up backboard and lopsided hoop I felt like Sloane was laughing at me, mocking me. I had caught Yi Po giving me a few confused looks after I came inside after only a few minutes at the hoop, but I pretended not to notice.

  Now she was doing something nice for me, which made me feel worse.

  I had one ace in the hole. We’d been going to Mamma Lucia’s for my birthday ever since I was three. The waiters there put a candle in my dessert and sing “Happy Birthday” in Italian. Maybe there was a way to get out of this dinner.

  When Dad came home from work, I met him as he came in the door.

  Dad drew in a deep sniff. “Something smells a-mazing!” he sang out.

  Darn! I should have put a fan by the door to keep away the smells coming from the kitchen. “We’re going to Mamma Lucia’s tonight, right? Because we always go on my birthday?”

  Dad ran his hand through his hair. “I leave all that planning to your mother, honey,” he said. “Whatever happens, I’m sure we can work something out.”

  When Mom came home, though, things went downhill in a hurry. She and Dad had one of those whispered parental conversations with lots of hand gesturing and glancing at me.

  When they were done, Mom came to me. “Honey, I know that sometimes we go to Mamma Lucia’s for your birthday …”

  “We always go to Mamma Lucia’s for my birthday,” I corrected.

  “But,” Mom cleared her throat. “But … Yi Po has been in the kitchen working on a special dish for you.” She looked at me. Tell me something I don’t know.

  “Maybe we could have it for dinner tomorrow?” I said hopefully. And maybe I’ll get invited to Madison’s house tomorrow.

  “Lucy, we’ll go to Mamma Lucia’s tomorrow. How can we go out when Yi Po has worked so hard?” said Mom.

  Of course she was right. I had known that all along. “What did she make?” I asked.

  “Noodles. She made the noodles for you, Lucy. Just like the noodles she made for Daddy in China. It’s traditional to eat long noodles on your birthday, to symbolize long life.”

  Long life. Ha. With Sloane on my case, that didn’t seem likely.

  Kenny was so excited about dinner you would have thought it was his birthday. He kept pacing around the dining room table and rubbing his hands together while Yi Po finished up in the kitchen.

  I, on the other hand, sat in my chair, arms crossed, stomach tight and closed. I consoled myself with one thought: Maybe it won’t taste good.

  Mom, Dad, and Yi Po marched into the dining room — a three-person parade. Dad was holding the soup tureen, Mom was carrying a cake with a candle in it, and Yi Po was waving a ladle. They all sang “Happy Birthday,” except that Yi Po didn’t know about the third line when the rhythm changes and you add the name of the person. She just sang “Happy Birthday to you” over and over.

  Okay, it was kind of cute.

  Yi Po put the ladle down on the table and went back into the kitchen. Then she came back cradling a brand-new backboard and hoop in her arms, struggling a bit through the doorway. She hefted it into my lap. For a moment I didn’t do anything. I couldn’t have been more surprised if Pat Summitt herself had delivered it.

  I ran my hands over the smooth board and stuck my fingers through the white, nylon netting. It had been years since I’d had a good net on the rim.

  All this time I had thought Yi Po was judging me, waiting for me to tell my parents the truth about what happened. But maybe I had been wrong.

  I tried to think of something to say, but Dad went first.

  “Yi Po insisted that we get you a new backboard. Mom and I weren’t so sure, but Yi Po said that you needed it.”

  My heart rose, and in that moment, something became completely clear to me. Dad had meant, You needed a new hoop to replace the old one, but Yi Po understood that I needed to play ball, just as I needed to eat and sleep. And maybe she cared more about what happened to me than what happened to our house.

  For the first time maybe ever, I looked at Yi Po, really looked at her, without being mad or annoyed or worried about how my Chinese sounded. Her eyes were shiny and a huge smile stretched across her face.

  “Thank you,” I said. “Xie xie.” I hoped that she could tell from the tone of my voice that I didn’t mean a thanks kind of thank-you; it was a thank-you-for-thinking-of-me-with-this-perfect-gift kind of thank you. And more than that, I meant thank you for believing in me.

  I think she understood because even though she nodded and said, “Bu yong xie,” which means no thanks necessary, that huge smile never left her face.

  Yi Po then busied herself serving the soup. I was served first, and right away, I could tell it was different. Broth from a can doesn’t smell this good. It had the good chicken-salty smell, but also whiffs of ginger and scallion. It smelled golden.

  She had to have made the broth from scratch. Just like my grandmother used to, when she simmered the chicken in a pot all day, slowly adding spices.

  I dipped my chopsticks into the noodles, looped them around and took my first bite.

 
; Mmmmmmm. I could see how these noodles were instantly recognizable to Dad — the way you know someone from their handwriting or the way they walk. They were just like Po Po’s — so perfect you couldn’t imagine them any other way. Fat slices of beef floated near the top, surrounded by sprigs of cilantro and rings of onion.

  To my right, Kenny was sighing and chewing and swallowing and sighing.

  And then I couldn’t eat any more, not because I was done eating or because I didn’t want to eat, but because a thousand thoughts and feelings began to rush through me. Because I had a new backboard and hoop. Because I had someone in my family who actually wanted me to play basketball. Because, in spite of not being at Mamma Lucia’s, I was having a wonderful birthday. Because the noodles were so familiar and good, and because I suddenly remembered what my grandmother used to say when we told her how much we loved her noodles. She used to say, They taste good because you can taste how much love I put into them. And I could no longer deny that the person who made them loved me, and maybe, just maybe, I loved her back.

  I jumped up from my chair and wrapped my arms around Yi Po. Mom has always said that Chinese are not as huggy and kissy as Americans, but her gentle hug felt as if she had been waiting for me all along.

  It didn’t get magically easier from there. My Chinese didn’t blossom overnight, though I did notice that I was understanding more and more. Yi Po picked up an English phrase here and there — she liked saying high five, and used it for everything, including when I took out the garbage. But things were definitely different and that was a good thing. Instead of a foggy glass shield between us, we now had a clear view of each other.

  I even figured out the mystery of where she was going every day. One day I came home to sixteen old people sitting at card tables spread out over the living room and dining room. They were playing mah-jongg.

  Yi Po waved at me as I came in and then introduced me with her arm around me. This is my niece! Everyone smiled and went back to their games, except for one man who immediately got up from his seat.